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Now You Can Replicate Your Pet, But it’s Gonna Cost You!

In a news story today it was stated that a Japanese Company, RNL Bio will clone your pet for $150,000.00, and you only pay upon delivery. RNL is responsible for cloning the first dog named Snuppy, short for Seoul National University Puppy. Snuppy is a male afghan hound and he was born April 24, 2005. Yeah, that long ago.

Here’s his picture with his, “Parents.” He is the one in the middle:

But Snuppy is not the first “pet breed” to be cloned below is a picture of Cc, (stands for Copy Cat) who was born on Valentines Day 2002, the company that produced her has gone out of business for failure to generate enough profits. I guess they weren’t charging enough:

A Brief History of Cloning:

1996 Dolly The Sheep who actually died on Valentines Day 2003 at the age of 6.

October 3 1997 Cumulina the mouse is born, followed shortly after by 22 of her siblings some of whom were cloned from clones, kinda creepy

December 25, 2001 pigs were cloned

and August 7, 2003 a horse named Prometia was cloned:

And now we have glow in the dark cats:

How do you feel about this technology? In my opinion it would best be used to repopulate extinct species, well I guess we can’t do that because they are already extinct. But what about those animals that are in danger of extinction, shouldn’t we be working on a way to clone them? I love dogs and cats, I really do, but don’t we have enough animals who need homes that weren’t created in labs?

According to the World Wild Life Federation this is the top 10 endangered species list:

Black Rhino

Giant Panda

Tiger

Beluga Sturgeon

Golden Seal

Alligator Snapping Turtle

Hawksbill Turtle

Big Leaf Mahogany (a tree)

Green-Cheeked Parrot

Mako Shark

Many whale species are endangered or already extinct, endangered are the Right Whale, Bowhead Whale, Blue Whale, Fin Whale, Sei Whale, Humpback Whale, Sperm Whale, Vaquita (only a few hundred are left), and there are more, but I think you get the picture. Thought to be extinct already are the Indigo Pacific Hump Backed Dolphin and the Atlantic Hump Back Dolphin. What good is cloning if I can’t help preserve a species?

We are going to miss you my friend:

The all but extinct Indo-Pacific Hump Back Dolphin . . .

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8 Responses

I am an endangered species. I need a clone to do my job because I can’t handle it alone! Kidding, kidding!
You’re right, this should serve to save endangered species, and why not, recreate those who have disappeared like the dodo.

Well you might not have to wait too long for your very own clone, and I think it would be marvelous to clone someone like you! I do think they should do it, but I never read about them doing it for those purposes….

You said, “but don’t we have enough animals who need homes that weren’t created in labs?” I feel the same way about children. Why involve science to create children (egg donors, sperm donors, surrogates, etc)? There are enough children who need homes.

That’s an excellent point, like there already so many dogs and cats at the shelter who don’t have home, we should definitely be cloning the rare ones….and how come that cloned puppy looks like he has furry boobs? LOL ;-)

You are so observant! I didn’t notice the furry boobs, I will have to take a second look . . .lol ;)

Hey, i’m in a bachelor of Biomedical Science in Australia, one of my subjects at the moment is molecular genetics and…wouldnt know you it…my seminar tomorrow is on the ethics of cloning. Well…a couple of things you might find interesting.
Firstly, and hopefully to your delight, there is a thing called the frozen zoo containing frozen tissues of endangered animals which can be cloned. Also efforts at cloning endangered and extinct animals have been considered and attempted, even in Australia on the Tasmanian Tiger. However the mechanism of this, SCNT (somatic cell nuclear transfer) is very inefficient and involves…basically, replacing and embryonic nucleus with another nucleus from a developed cell.
Secondly, to eleaborate on genetic differences in animals…sorry to bust your bubble there but yes they are. What you’re getting confused with is the basis for what our DNA encodes – proteins – which are the same for a species and even across species. For example the Citric Acid Cycle is the same for even some bacteria and humans. DNA variations however are also hugely unique, an example of this in people are what’s called Microsatellite Markers (wikipedia it). Even clones have genetic differences however in what’s called Mitochondrial DNA. Whilst the nucleus of the cell is cloned the DNA in the mitochondria of the clone will be the same as the ‘egg’ cell or oocyte that the nucleus was transferred to.
True cloning is observed in bacterial binary fission or parthenogenesis where a new plant is formed from a clipping.
Finally…cloning is by no means a mechanism of mass production, dont worry about overpopulation issues. Dolly took 227 (or whatever it was) oocytes. In human females that’s 227 ovulation cycles…at 1 a month that’s like almost 20 years worth of bad moods.
However if you consider cloning the true champion to the cause or trophy product of it…is the process of molecular cloning and it’s application in drug manufacture (eg. Human Insulin production in bacteria).